Truly Unspeakable
by Okina
Summary: Rebecca has been an Unspeakable (from the Dept. of Mysteries) for a few years. With so many fascinating secrets around, why does she hate her job so much? And why is Rebecca's job about to get a lot more dangerous? NEW CHAPTER!
1. Rebecca Paudany

Author's Note: I didn't create the ideas behind Harry Potter. Those ideas belong to JK Rowling.  
  
This story does jump from present to past and back. I don't think this is confusing, so, if you clicked the link to read this story, don't quit yet! Please read (this chapter is slightly over 3 pages long in 12 pt. Font) and review.  
  
Truly Unspeakable  
The Story of Rebecca Paudany  
  
I look into the mirror and frown at the face smiling back at me. Even a mirror that shows people in an "optimistic" way can't change the fact that I have always looked awful in black. All Unspeakables wear only black to work, and I'd bet a million Galleons that most of them wear black at home as well.  
For the first time since... last Tuesday, I curse the day I ever decided to be an Unspeakable.  
  
"You have the marks to get into any N.E.W.T. courses you want. You have the talent to be competent at whatever job you choose and the will to succeed," Professor Flitwick said at my career advice meeting. He laughed a little. "By Merlin, you would be an Unspeakable if you really wanted."  
"An Unspeakable?" I asked.  
"A Ministry worker in the Department of Mysteries," he explained.  
"What kind of mysteries?" I asked, more curiously now.  
Professor Flitwick was frowning, although I barely noticed at the time. "I don't know. I was only kidding. There are only a few Unspeakables, for good reasons. They're very secretive."  
If my mind wasn't made up before, it was then. Finding out about the Ministry's mysteries? Being secretive? Having as cool a job title as "Unspeakable?"  
"You really think I could become one?"  
"Yes, but- ''  
"Is it hard to become one?" I interrupted.  
"The standards are high, but there aren't many qualified applicants, so there's not much competition for positions."  
"What do I have to do?" I asked, excitedly. I had been dreading this appointment because I had no idea what I wanted to do after Hogwarts. Now I had a goal.  
"You'd have to get good N.E.W.T.'s in Charms, Transfiguration, Potions, Defense Against the Dark Arts, and Divination. Arithmacy wouldn't hurt, either. Then, you'd have to apply and get accepted, of course. And take an oath, but- ''  
"Is that all?" I interrupted, again.  
"It would be very difficult. That is a lot of challenging classes."  
He was right, but I'd been taking a full load of classes, and had been coping well enough with the upcoming OWLS. I was a good student and could learn quickly when I applied myself.  
"I can do that."  
"I believe you could. Rebecca, please listen. It's not a glamorous job. I've taught a few people who became Unspeakables. I've never met one outside of Hogwarts. There are strict rules that- ''  
"They've got to keep their secrets," I said, smiling.  
Professor Flitwick frowned even more and sighed deeply. He looked up at me for several seconds.  
"Do some research on Unspeakables," he said. "With the classes you'll be taking, you'll have more than enough schooling for most jobs if you change your mind. You may go."  
  
I don't blame Professor Flitwick. I didn't listen to him long enough. I did research on Unspeakables, but there wasn't much more information than what he'd told me, which fascinated me even more. I wanted to know their secrets.  
Damn my curiosity. And the Ministry of Magic. The Department of "Mysteries." Oh, it holds mysteries, all right. I'm scared of most of what's behind those doors, and I've only seen about half of what's in the Department. The other half I try not to think about. I know too much as it is.  
If only my mum hadn't wandered into that Muggle library when she was fifteen, exploring a Muggle town near her home. If only she hadn't gotten hooked on Muggle literature- namely thrillers. She loved Tom Clancy, that American author who wrote books like The Hunt for Red October. She introduced his books to me.  
During my second through fourth years at Hogwarts, I'd wanted to work for the United State's Central Intelligence Agency. I'd wanted to hunt down bad groups with worse weapons. I'd wanted to save the world.  
  
"What do you want to do after you get out of Hogwarts, Becca?" Mum asked me one night at the kitchen table. I was doing homework for my fourth year while Mum monitoring the dishes, which were washing themselves in the sink.  
"I want to work for the C.I.A.," I answered, thinking more about the Goblin Rebellions than her question.  
"From the books?" she asked.  
"Yes."  
She laughed. "Why on Earth would you want to do that?"  
I told her.  
She laughed again. "Becca, it's admirable that you want to help save the world... but why not save your world, and let the Muggles deal with their own."  
"There are wizards who work for the C.I.A., Mum. I read it in a magazine at the Healer's office."  
"Don't you want to be the Minister of Magic or the Headmistress of Hogwarts or something like that?" she asked.  
I laughed. "Mum, those are little kid dreams."  
"Are they?"  
"Yes. I want to be a C.I.A. agent."  
"OK. I'll visit you in America."  
  
I haven't seen Mum or Dad since Christmas, which was six months ago. I don't see much of anyone outside of the Ministry, and those outside of my department I really only see passing in the halls.  
I turn away from the mirror. For the past three years and five months, spending a few minutes thinking about how much I despise my job has been a part of my morning routine. The fact that it has been over a week since I remember thinking about it tells me that one of three things has happened.  
Number one is that thinking about hating my job every morning has become so routine that I don't remember doing it. It's like brushing my teeth. I brush my teeth the same way twice a day, so when I get to work in the morning and think "Did I brush my teeth this morning?" I can't remember if I did or not. I probably did, but I wasn't thinking about it.  
Another thing it could mean is that I've been way too busy to spare a few minutes for an unnecessary part of my routine, especially one that makes me feel depressed. This is possible.... I have been busy.  
Finally, I may just be getting used to hating most parts of my job. During a short lunch break, once, my boss, Jacob Bode, told me this would happen.  
  
"All Unspeakables hate their jobs for the first few years," Bode said, taking a sip of coffee.  
"I don't hate my job. I loathe it. I despise it. I detest it. Take everything this is locked up in That Room... the love, the honesty, the justice... then take the opposite of it all. That's how I feel about my job," I said, angrily.  
He laughed, making me even angrier.  
"I mean it."  
"I know you do. I haven't forgotten. Maybe I still feel that way, and I've just gotten used to it."  
"You don't like your job, then," I said. I was hoping some people could grow to like it.  
He sighed. "I'm not sure that it's possible to like our jobs. I'm fascinated by our work. I'm never bored with it. That's something, isn't it? We could be like the wizards in the Treasury Department. They hate their jobs, and are bored with them.  
"At least they have lives," I muttered.  
"We keep an eye on Life," he answered.  
  
I look at the clock and realize I'm going to be late. I worry for all of two seconds. No one will say anything. A few minutes won't make any difference to the other Unspeakables. They don't have a few minutes to waste scolding me over a few wasted minutes.  
I Apparate into the atrium of the Ministry and run to the elevators. Ignoring the other person already in there, I tell the elevator where I need to go. The other person will have to wait. My floor has the priority in this elevator.  
"Late?"  
I look at the person standing beside me for the first time. I've never seen him before. That's not that unusual. A lot of wizards work for the Ministry and most wizards have business here eventually.  
"Not if I run," I answer.  
He smiles a little. "You're an Unspeakable, then. All black. Don't have to follow the clock."  
"It still doesn't pay to be late."  
"No, it doesn't."  
"Are you late?"  
He checks his watch. "I am... now."  
"Sorry," I say, insincerely. "Where do you work?"  
"I'm interviewing."  
"Sorry," I say again, but meaning it this time.  
"What's your name?" he asks.  
"Rebecca Paudany."  
The doors open and I step out and begin running down the hallway, towards the Department.  
"Are you the youngest?" the man calls.  
"As far as I know," I yell back as I reach the door. I don't know if he heard me.  
I enter the blue, circular chamber and close the door behind me. The twelve doors spin around for a few seconds. I take my wand out of my pocket and hold it out in front of me.  
"Rebecca Paudany. Department of Mysteries. Existence Sub- department."  
My wand glows a little as the room checks my identity. Satisfied that I am who I say I am, one of the doors opens. I walk through and the door slams shut behind me.  
I've been an Unspeakable for four years. In any other department, I'd have been promoted at least three times. In the Department of Mysteries, I have to wait for another sucker to join the Ministry or a very lucky person to die before I'll get out of the Existence Sub-Department.  
Most of the department deals with concepts, like love, hate, time, death, life, and knowledge. However, everyone starts out in Existence. It's more cut and dry. It's also exhausting and repetitive. If you don't lose your mind before the next Unspeakable is hired, you're promoted. 


	2. Existence Duties

Author's Note: Ah! Look, a reader! Well, thank you, Reader, for continuing to dive into the world of the Unspeakable. You've met the main character: Rebecca. And you've met the antagonist. You've also been introduced to the true star of this story: the Department of Mysteries.  
  
This next section will show you what happens in the first and most basic Subdepartment in the Department of Mysteries, and will contain one more of Rebecca's memories.  
  
Please read and review!  
  
I spend the first half of my morning going over the report for the night. I check to make sure that there are one or two specimens of each species that went extinct overnight in our life-sustaining area. We like to have them on hand, in case it ever became necessary to put a species back into the food chain.  
  
Next, I take the list of species that had become endangered the day before and check where they were on the food web and the ecology charts. If they were directly tied to humans, I have to inform the Department of Nature, or more correctly, Steve Mann, who is the only member of that department.  
  
After that extremely tedious job, I have to check to make sure that no seemingly insignificant universal event is going to end life as we know it on Earth. This is my favorite job, because I get to see models of all of the parts of the universe that we believe affect our solar system: an area roughly 10^20 to 10^40 cubic light-years. Potential problems flash a bright purple color on the models.  
  
In four years, I've had to nudge a dozen or so comets and a couple of asteroids off of the normal orbit, because they were on a collision course with Earth. Granted, they weren't going to hit us for several billion years, but I have to move them before the Muggle astronomers see them. Muggles don't know much about space, but they know how asteroids are supposed to move.  
  
And, or course, there's the daily task of ever so slightly changing the course of the galaxy Andromeda, which the Muggles this is going to merge with the Milky Way in hundreds of billions of years. We've known about the problem for centuries, and have been working to prevent. Again, we have to do it slowly, so the Muggles don't notice.  
  
Not that it really matters if we correct the problem or not. Our sun will engulf Earth long before Andromeda poses any threat. There's nothing we can do about that. We could move the sun, if we really wanted to, but we can't do anything about how much energy stars have. Our sun will be what brings an end to humanity. The Muggles thing it will be nuclear weapons, but we have an emergency plan for that. If a nuclear war begins, we will simply magic all nuclear weapons into deep space. (How the Ministry explains this disappearance is another department's problem.)  
  
Before lunch, I look quickly over the models of inner Earth. The plate tectonics and magma flows look all right. There won't be any earth ending catastrophes from earthquakes or volcanoes today. However, a fairly big earthquake is going to hit Japan this afternoon.  
  
I buy lunch in the cafeteria. I'm about to take it back to the Department, but I realize I have fifteen more minutes than I usually do at this time a day (which is negative five.) I sit down at a nearby table.  
  
I find myself thinking about the upcoming earthquake. People will probably die. I could stop it fairly easily. I close my eyes against the thought.  
  
**  
  
"It's going to be bad! Hundreds may die!" I said.  
  
I had been working for only a few weeks. This was the first major natural disaster I knew was coming before it happened. (I was never good at Divination. I memorized the text books and faked it when I took my O.W.L. and N.E.W.T. exams.)  
  
"You can't intervene. Just forget about it. Don't watch the Muggle news. Don't read Muggle newspapers. Ever. You'll go crazy if you do," Bode said.  
  
I had sent him a memo, telling him to come right away because it was an emergency. He'd sprinted in seconds later, looking like he thought it was the end of the world. He was very upset when he found out that it wasn't... that it was far from it, in fact.  
  
"People will die!"  
  
"They always do!"  
  
"I could save them!"  
  
"Don't you think I've argued your points? I was the last person in here, remember?" he asked.  
  
Of course I remembered. He'd spent seven years in Existence. When I started working, I had been looking forward to the years in front of me as an Unspeakable.  
  
"I could save them!"  
  
"Then why didn't you? Why did you call me in here?" he asked, more patiently.  
  
I collapsed into my chair, tears starting to enter my eyes. I was repulsed by myself because of the answer.  
  
"I'm not supposed to," I spat. I wasn't supposed to intervene, and I was following the rules, allowing real people to die because of them. I was supposed to let people die.  
  
Bode sat down in one of the many empty chairs in the room I mainly work in. It contains most of the models of everything.  
  
"I know how you feel, Paudany. Each one of us does. We've all had to deal with that first tragedy."  
  
"What was yours?" I asked, trying not to cry.  
  
He looked down. "It was an earthquake, as well."  
  
"How big?"  
  
"Big enough."  
  
"What did you do?"  
  
"I let it happen. It wasn't until two days later, when I found out that it had only been a tremor, and that the real earthquake was coming up that I called in Croaker, the man ahead of me."  
  
I didn't say anything. I stared at the place the epicenter of the quake was going to be.  
  
"Each of us is put in a position, right away, where we can play God. This Subdepartment is the true test of the Unspeakables; not that written test you took to get in here. Every concept that can be found in the Department of Mysteries we come to terms with in Existence: power, knowledge, love, hate, life, death, faith... fate.  
  
"Rebecca, you have a great amount of power and very little authority to use it. You're allowed to save humanity, but you can't save people. And that hurts... because let's face it... if all people were to disappear, it would probably be good for the rest of the Earth. Hardly a tragedy. Who would mourn humanity's death? But when one person dies-"  
  
"I thought you were going to make me feel better," I said, angrily, wiping my eyes.  
  
"You're better off hearing it now, because God knows how long it will take you to come to grips with it," Bode responded, forcefully, but not unkindly.  
  
"I'll never come to grips it," I muttered.  
  
When Bode didn't answer this, I knew I was right.  
  
"Maybe I can help more," Bode said. "Everyone dies, right?"  
  
"Of course. Except for the Flamels."  
  
"They're the exception. There are many deaths we have no control over, right? Murders, accidents, and so on."  
  
"Yes."  
  
"So, who are you to decide who dies and who lives?"  
  
"By saving those I can," I said, stubbornly. I knew what he meant, but at the moment found it irrelevant.  
  
"And if the people you save were supposed to die? What if you ended up saving a little boy who grew up to be the next Voldemort?"  
  
I shuddered. (Even four years ago that was a name to fear. Now the name itself is horrifying.)  
  
"You understand, then. We can't see the future. Hell, we're the ones making sure the future remains a mystery, except to an extraordinary few with a gift. You understand why you can't intervene?"  
  
"Yes."  
  
Bode stood up. "Try not to think about it for the rest of the day. Forget it if you can."  
  
"I can't."  
  
"Probably not," Bode admitted. He walked over to the door and paused before leaving. "And Paudany?"  
  
"Yeah?"  
  
"Next time you write 'Emergency!' on something, please mean it."  
  
I smiled a little. "Sorry."  
  
He nodded. "It's OK. Now... I've got to go feed Life." He left quickly.  
  
**  
  
On top of his duties, Bode had to help me adjust to being an Unspeakable. He still has to help me every now and then. If he can deal with his job and my moral dilemmas without going crazy, he'll get promoted when the next person enters the Department.  
  
I break out of my thoughts and memories when I notice that I've finished my lunch. I don't have time to eat a full lunch....  
  
I jump up, cursing loudly. Ignoring the looks I'm getting, I scan over the walls, looking for a clock. By the time I realize I'm wasting time trying to figure out what time it is, I discover I'm ten minutes late.  
  
I sprint to the elevators and jump into one that's doors just opened.  
  
"Department of Mysteries!"  
  
The elevator doors close and the elevator starts moving down.  
  
"You could have let me out."  
  
The same man who I'd shared an elevator with this morning is leaning up against the wall, smirking.  
  
"You again?" I say.  
  
"That's the first thing that popped into my head, too, but I decided not to say it."  
  
I frown. "You interviewed all morning?"  
  
"I had to take a test, too."  
  
I raise my eyebrows and turn back to the doors, waiting to start running again.  
  
"I got the job."  
  
"Congratulations," I say blandly.  
  
The doors open and I burst out of the elevator at top speeds. I'm going to have to stop thinking, I think as I run down the hallway.  
  
After getting back to my room, I check the list of species that went extinct or became endangered this morning. Everything checks out.  
  
Next, I check to see if there are any extraterrestrials that could be threatening within a short distance of Earth. We know of sixteen species that have an equal or greater intelligence level to that of humans. Eight of these alien species have entered their Space Ages. Three of them are able to reach Earth. We've told them we don't feel comfortable with them entering our solar system until Muggle are able to leave it. At that time, we think Muggles will be more comfortable with the idea of E.T.s. All three of the aliens' world governments agreed to obey our wishes. However, there's not much we can do to stop their scientists from conducting their experiments. They don't pose a threat to humanity.  
  
After sending a very politely worded letter (no need to start an intergalactic war over one planet getting offended) to the government of the Pztlevkitmxs about the increased number of abductions by their race, I move right along to making sure nothing is threatening any of the sixteen alien species' existences. We figure if we save an alien race, we might be able to call in a favor later.  
  
The next good portion of my day is spent trying to control the climate. The climate has to be changed gradually, so as not to overwhelm the planet, throwing most of its species into extinction (I'd have to spend a week checking the list.), but the climate also has to change, to keep evolution moving. The damn Muggles don't make it any easier. It's bad enough we're coming out of an Ice Age. They have to speed things along with their pollution.  
  
I'm getting tired, but I have to make sure the universe is still expanding, make sure nothing poses an immediate threat to Earth, and check the levels of magic on Earth. The three tasks take about fifteen minutes all together.  
  
Finally, I'm ready to sign out for the night. I sign my name in the "Blame Book" next to "February 22, 1980 A.D." If humans go extinct overnight, the Head Unspeakable (whoever that is) will know who's to blame. What a waste of time. After all, I'm the only one in the Existence Subdepartment.  
  
I stagger into the circular entrance room and hold out my wand.  
  
"Rebecca Paudany. Let me out."  
  
My wand glows. A door opens to the hallway leading to the elevator. Ten minutes late, I'm at home, in the kitchen, fixing dinner.  
  
Author's Note:  
  
This is a decent place to break off for now. Hey... if you have any other ideas for Subdepartments of the Department of Mysteries and what people's jobs are in them (especially for the Subdepartment of Life... I've already mentioned one, but would appreciate others), please include them in your reviews. (It's a good way to be mentioned in an Author's Note! "Wow, hot dog!", right? :) (Yep, that was my cough subtle way of trying to trick you into reviewing.)  
  
Here's a list of the Subdepartments I've got so far: Existence, Life, Hate, Love, Time, Death, Knowledge, Fate, Faith, Power  
  
Some of these may be branches of others. For example, Death may be a branch of Life. Faith may be a branch of Fate. 


End file.
